The City is the service utility provider offering electric and water service to the citizens of Burley and the surrounding area.

The City desires to improve this service by installing an Advanced Metering Infrastructure System (AMI). The City’s primary objective is to have a fixed network AMI with an accuracy of 99% or more for all meters in the system. It is expected that the system will collect and process electric energy in kwh, electric demand in kw and water usage in gallons; provide for remote connects and disconnects plus report alarms, alerts, and exceptions. Future upgrades may include power factor, meter time of use/rate, load profile, provide two-way load management control, and enable other advancements in customer services.

The City appreciates the Vendor’s expertise and capabilities and does not intend to address every feature and component of the AMI system. The opportunity is given to allow vendors to suggest the best solution, following the requirements set by the City.

System Parameters

The system shall be fully interoperable with standard IEEE 802.11 (WiFi) networking devices.

System Capacity and Scalability

The system shall utilize leading technology and architecture to ensure compatibility with all identified meter types and models.

The system shall be a two-way system.

The system shall have the ability to read meters equipped with absolute encoder high resolution registers capable of leak detection, reverse flow, tamper detection, outage management, as well as electric energy and demand and gallons of water.

Installation

The vendor shall be responsible for complete and timely installation and change-outs of all equipment except the City will change out all electric meters and install collectors in electrical distribution area. The vendor may utilize the services of equipment suppliers or service agencies to do the physical installation, but this does not relieve the vendor of any responsibility for installation.

The vendor’s project manager will remain in contact for any installation issues or problems and be available at all times.

Reliability and Fault-tolerance

The system shall offer high levels of reliability and deliver no less 99% of information from all meters in the system. The system shall be automatic fail- over protection at multiple levels, including the connection to the WiFi network.

The system as proposed must provide protection against local environmental disrupters, including transient power failures, and resiliency for interference. This protection must operate automatically and not require manual intervention.

Network Topology

Vendor shall specify the topology of the proposed system and identify the number of device options and backhaul connection points.

Hardware

The devices and related equipment shall support multiple power configurations. It shall offer easy straightforward mounting. The collectors shall be industrial-grade and designed for outdoor environments.

Network Management

The system shall offer an application for centralized management control. The application shall be fully compliant with the Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) network management standard. The vendor shall specify how such application provides central management and control over the network. The vendor shall also describe the system monitoring, logging, troubleshooting and diagnostic capabilities.

Security

The system shall offer the highest-level of security at multiple layers utilizing proven, industry-standard security technologies. The vendor shall describe the operation of each security layer, as well as the encryption scheme(s) used.

Warranty Maintenance Requirements

The vendor shall indicate the warranty period for both system hardware and software components. The vendor shall describe the different maintenance/support plans available after the warranty period.

Training Requirements

The vendor shall provide a training plan identifying the number of training hours that will be provided as a part of the base package. The plan will identify the actual training hours and describe the size and assumed skill levels of each group. The courses should indicate whether the location will be on-site or off- site training.

Documentation

During implementation the vendor shall provide a full set of documentation required to operate and maintain the proposed system including hardware, software, computer operations users and reference guides. The vendor shall provide one electronic and one paper master copy from which the City may make in-house copies.

The system shall have a full communication system to each end-point design.

The system shall have flexible communications architecture to provide AMI coverage where electric meters can function as repeaters to both receive and transmit messages from other electric meters.

The architecture shall support multiple repeater levels through peer-to-peer communications technology.

Each network entry/exit device must support numerous end-points to minimize backhaul communication requirements for connectivity to the host.

The system shall support remote on-demand meter readings for data and system health checks, support multiple monthly billing schedules, and provide on- request reads (acquire single meter read in less than one minute) as needed for billing or other customer service needs.

The system shall support remote activation of service connects and disconnects to selected electric meters.

Vendor shall fully describe the complete field AMI network and all hardware, software, and communications necessary for the backhaul of metering data.

The system shall support automatic registration of meters on the network. All radios in the meters and network shall be programmed to validate the unique location of the device or components.

The system shall be self-forming, self-diagnosing and self-healing in its communication.

For time accuracy of electric meter interval data, time of use demand periods shall be synchronized.

The system shall provide necessary interfacing for importing/exporting billing data with the Caselle Application program.

The system shall have an outage reporting system.

The system shall support remote upgrades and all programming for the AMI module and meter software.

Vendor shall fully describe the Host Station computer hardware and software, including:

All hardware and software requirements. Recognized commercially available manufactures are preferred.

Graphical User Interface, a web browser based interface is required.

File formats for data import and export. XML or similar industry standard interfaces are preferred.

Ability to support remote procedure calls or Application Program Interfaces is preferred.

LAN or WAN connections for remote meter reading and enterprise system connection.

Environmental requirements

Fixed network

Software support and updates.

Vendor shall fully describe the networking monitoring functions including:

The network monitoring function shall provide for management of the collectors including configuration.

Optimization of meter assignment to the collector.

Management and download of any collector operating software upgrades.

The network monitoring function shall provide an alarm processing configuration and management including the ability to assign alarms to specific events and to communicate the alarm conditions to designate single or multiple individuals.

The system shall have the option to send the alarm notification to designated individuals via e-mail, pager, etc.

The results of alarms, events and activities shall be recorded and logged to provide support and trouble shooting function.

Reports shall be selectable and printable by the system operator.

All electric meters shall be electronic type with internal AMI communications module and a readily-visible front display of all billing data including energy and demand. Vendor shall advise their display’s capabilities including number of digits, decimal placement, etc. for a standard billing quantities.

Meter display shall indicate direction of rotation (energy flow), provide means for standard optical accuracy testing and display and report key meter status indications.

An interface must be available for accuracy testing and local meter programming activities.

Remote metering data shall be obtained directly from the meter’s electronic registers hourly. Consumption or billing data read remotely from the meter shall also be readable at the meter display.

Meters and system shall provide advanced kWh energy flow and tampering and then flag the host with a date/time stamp when event occurs.

Meters will be upgradeable to enable prepay solutions, as well as Home Area Network (HAN) (ex. Zigbee based).

Meters shall be upgradeable and allow for remote implementation without meter change outs. Upgrades shall include multiple schedule Time-of-Use (TOU) with at least 4 tiers, load profile, data collection and power factor.

At a minimum all meters shall support block demand metering and include remote demand reset capability.

All meters will communicate with collector by RF and support two-way communications.

For load profiling, it shall be possible for meters to read and store interval data collectable at programmed times.

The system shall provide the meter’s line side voltage information for each meter site.

Meters shall provide outage/blink counts with time/date stamps.

Meters shall provide status indications of key metering functions such as processor check-sum errors, memory errors, memory overflow, etc.

Vendors shall describe the meter and system’s capability to monitor power outages and power restoration status.

An optional remote service disconnect/connect feature shall be available that is incorporated under the meter cover so that the appearance is exactly the same as an AMI meter without remote disconnect/connect feature- i.e. no collar device. The meter shall support remote control of the disconnect switch, ability to monitor status of switch contacts, and shall include the ability to offer a demand limiting feature in lieu of a disconnect command. Disconnects shall not be closable on the event of detection of voltage on the load side of the meter and shall advise the host operator if this condition exists.

Commercial meters shall support remote reading of real total energy, demand and time- of-use (TOU) metering quantities. Meters shall optionally support reactive energy, demand and TOU, bidirectional metering for real or reactive quantities and provide four channels of load profile interval data.

Meter communication devises shall be located under the meter cover and meet all applicable requirements of ANSI C12.20.

Software for support or programming of the electronic meter shall be compatible with PC’s using Microsoft Windows XP operating systems and allow use of a standard optical probe for local meter interface.

Meters shall have automatic voltage ranging on all meters.

Meter failure rate shall be 0.5% or less over 20 years.